GENERAL CHARACTERS AND CLASSIFICATION OF PHYLUM ANNELIDA

UPTO CLASSES
ACADEMIC SCRIPT

Introduction

The term Annelida is derived from two words one is Latin, annulus means a ring

and another is Greek, eidos means form. Annelids are typical animals that burrow

or crawl upon the bottom in the ocean or in fresh water. Some are free swimming,

at least during the breeding season, and others are adapted to life in moist soil.

Many marine species build permanent tube which they inhabit and in other

species the tube is temporary, like a burrow, and may be abandoned for another.

Some annelids are actively predaceous, seizing their prey in well-developed jaws.
Others are notably permanently tube dwelling polychaets that feed upon
microscopic particulate matters brought in by ciliated tentacles or entrapped in
sheets of mucous.

General Characters of Annelida

1. 1. Mostly aquatic, some terrestrial. Burrowing or tubicolous. Some

commensal and parasitic.
1. 2. These are triploblastic and true coelomate animals. Coelom is with a
watery coelomic fluid which acts as hydraulic skeleton and helps in
locomotion.
2. 3. Body is elongated and externally divided into segments called
metamers or somites by ring like grooves called annuli, so annelid is called
segmented worm. These were first segmented animals.
3. 4. Epidermis of a single layer of columnar epithelial cells, covered
externally by a thin cuticle not made of chitin.
4. 5. Body wall is formed of cuticle, single layered epidermis and only
smooth muscle fibres. Outer muscle fibres are circular, inner are
 longitudinal.
1. 6. Appendages are unjointed and segmentally repeated chitinous
bristles, called setae or chaetae are embedded in skin. May be borne by
lateral fleshy appendages or parapodia. Generally absent in hirudinea.
1. 7. Alimentary canal is straight and complete. Digestion is entirely
extracellular.
1. 8. These are the first animals to have closed circulatory system.
Respiratory pigments either haemoglobin or erythrocruorin are dissolved in
blood plasma.
2. 9. These generally show cutaneous or skin respiration by moist skin
(eg. Earthworm). Some have branchial (gill) respiration (eg. Amphitrite).
1. 10. Excretion occurs by segmentally arranged coiled organs, nephridia.

1. 11. Nervous system is formed of circum-pharyngeal nerve ring and a

solid, double, ventral and ganglionated nerve cord and lateral nerves in
each segment.
1. 12. Sensory organs include tactile organs, taste buds, statocysts,
photoreceptor cells and sometimes eyes with lenses in some.
2. 13. Sexes may be unisexual (eg. Nereis) or bisexual (eg. Leech,
Earthworm). Fertilization is generally cross and may be external (eg.
Nereis) or internal (eg. Leech).
1. 14. Cleavage is spiral and determinate. Development is direct and
indirect through a larval stage the trochophore. Regeneration is common.

CLASSIFICATION

Phylum Annelida includes about 8,700 living species. They are divided into four
main classes. The classification is primarily based on the basis of the presence or
absence of parapodia, setae, metamerism and other morphological features.

The four classes are:

 i. i. Polychaeta
i. ii. Oligochaeta
i. iii. Hirudinea and
iv. Archiannelida

CLASS 1. Polychaeta (Gr. Poly = many; chaeta = hair)

1. 1. These are chiefly marine and carnivores, some are fresh water.
1. 2. The body is composed of segments which are usually similar
internally as well as externally.
1. 3. Head consists of prostomium and peristomium and bears distinct
eyes, palps, serri and tentacles.
2. 4. Setae are numerous and are born up on lateral prominances of the
body wall known as parapodia.
1. 5. Parapodia is highly vascular and respiratory in function.
1. 6. Clitellum is absent.

7. 7. Coelom is spacious and usually divided in intersegmental septa.

7. 8. The blood vascular system is well developed and does not
communicate with coelom.
7. 9. Alimentary canal is provided with an eversible buccal region and
protrusible pharynx.
7. 10. Sexes are separate. Gonads are simple and developed by active
proliferation of coelomic epithelium.
7. 11. Fertilization is external and free swimming larval stage trochophore
is present.
7. 12. Asexual reproduction is by lateral budding.

Attempts to arrange families into orders has not proved satisfactory. It is

usual, therefore, to divide polychaetes into two subclasses, Errantia and
Sedentaria, after Fauvel (1959). However according to Dab (1963), this
subdivision is artificial and not a natural one.
Class Polychaeta is divided in two orders:

Order 1. Errentia

1. 1. They are Free-swimming (often pelagic), crawling, burrowing or

tube-dwelling and predatory polychaetes.
2. 2. All body segments are similar except at head and anal ends.
1. 3. Parapodia are provided with cirri and are equally developed
throughout. These are organs of locomotion.
2. 4. The head is usually definite with distinct prostomium which is
provided with eyes, tentacles and cirri.
1. 5. Pharynx is usually protrusible, enlarged and armed with chitinous
jaws and teeth.
1. 6. Clitellum is absent.
1. 7. The branchiae or gills are present but not restricted to anterior end
of body.

Examples: Aphrodite (sea mouse), Polynoe, Phyllodoce, Tomopteris,

Nereis, Eunice,
Histriobdella.

Order 2. Sedentaria

1. Sedentary polychaetes, live in burrows or tubes.

2. 2. Body is distinguished into two or three regions due to differences in

shape of segments, parapodia and setae.
2. 3. Head is small or much modified, without eyes and tentacles.
Prostomium is small and indistinct.
3. 4. Acicula and compound setae are absent.
2. 5. Pharynx is non-protrusible, without jaws or teeth.
2. 6. Gills, when present are situated only in the anterior segments of the
 body.
2. 7. Pharynx is non-protrusible and devoid of jaws or teeth. They feed
on plankton or organic detritus.
2. 8. The parapodia are peculiar which are confined in the posterior
region of body and without sirri.
Examples: Chaetopterus, Arenicola, Owenia, Sabella, Sabellaria,
Terebella, Amphitrite, Spirorbis, Serpula.

CLASS 2. Oligochaeta (Gr. Oligo = few; chaeta = hair)

1. 1. These are mostly terrestrial and some live in fresh water.

1. 2. Body is with conspicuous external and internal segmentation.
1. 3. Head is not distinct. Prostomium is usually small and without
sensory organs like eyes and tentacles.
2. 4. Setae are usually few, embedded in skin and arranged segmentally.
Parapodia and cirri are absent.
1. 5. Glandular clitellum is usually present for cocoon formation.
1. 6. Hermaphroditic. Gonads are complicated. Ovaries and testes are
compact structure. Testes are anterior to ovaries.
2. 7. Fertilization is external (in cocoon) and developmentis direct without
larval stages. Class Oligochaeta is divided in two orders.

Order 1. Plesiopora plesiothecata

1. 1. They are mostly aquatic forms.

1. 2. Body has few segments. Setae are present.

1. 3. Gizzard is either absent or poorly developed.

4. 4. Simple clitellum, consists of single layer of cells situated far forward.

4. 5. Eye spots are usually present.

 4. 6. Reproduction is both sexual and asexual.

4. 7. Male gonopores on segment immediately following that which

contains testes.

4. 8. Male reproductive openings lie in front of female reproductive

openings.

Examples: Aelosoma, Nais, Dero, Tubifex.

Order 2. Plesiopora prosothecata

1. 1. They are mostly terrestrial found in moist soil.

1. 2. Body is large with many segments.
1. 3. Setae are arranged in lumbricine manner.
1. 4. Gizzard is well developed.
1. 5. Clitellum is after 12th segment and is composed of two or more
layers of cells.
1. 6. Female genital apertures are before male genital pore and usually
lie in 14th segment.
1. 7. Spermathecae are far anterior to the segment containing testes.
1. 8. Eye spots are developed.
1. 9. Only sexual reproduction is seen.
1. 10. No free larval stage occurs.

Example: Pheretima, Lumbricus, Megascolex, Eutypheus

Order 3. Prosopora

1. 1. Mostly aquatic.
1. 2. Male gonopores are on the same segments containing testes, or on
segment containing the second pair of testes.

Example: Branchiobdella (parasitic)

Order 4. Opisthopora
 1. Mostly terrestrial earthworms.

2. Male gonopores are at some distance behind the testes-containing

segments.

Example: Lumbricus, Eisenia, Pheretima, Megascolex, Allolobophora,

Dendrobaena

CLASS 3. Hirudinea (L., hirudo, leech)

1. 1. They are freshwater, marine, terrestrial or free living. Some are

ectoparasitic and blood-sucking annelids or carnivorous.
1. 2. Body is segmented and is marked externally by ring like structure
called annuli. Segmentation is external without internal septa.
2. 3. Parapodia and setae are absent.
1. 4. Presence of anterior and posterior cup shaped suckers which are
organs of adhesion and locomotion.
1. 5. The ventral mouth lies in cup shaped hollow cavity of anterior
sucker.
1. 6. The anus is dorsal and situated just above the posterior sucker.
1. 7. The coelom is greatly reduced due to its filling by botryoidal
(connective) tissue, and forms haemocoelomic sinuses.
1. 8. The true blood vessels with definite muscular walls are present.
1. 9. The nervous system includes a brain united by small oesophageal
connectives to a double ganglionated ventral nerve cord.
1. 10. Nephridia are segmentally arranged and open independently to
exterior by nephridiopores, which are the organs of excretion.
2. 11. Hermaphrodite, the testes are many and segmentally arranged,
whereas ovary is single paired.
1. 12. Fertilization is internal. Development is direct without larval stages,
 in cocoons.

Class Hirudinea is divided into following orders:

Order 1. Acanthobdellida

1. 1. These are mostly ecto-parasitic on the fins of Salmon fishes.

1. 2. Body is generally composed of only twenty or twenty-one segments.
3. 3. Primitive, anterior sucker is absent but posterior sucker is well
developed and composed of four segments and jaws.
3. 4. Anterior five segments are provided with setae.
3. 5. Proboscis is small and not well developed.
3. 6. Body cavity is spacious and incompletely divided by septa.
3. 7. Vascular system consists of dorsal and ventral vessel.
3. 8. Coelom is with compartments.
3. 9. Nephridial opening is situated on the surface between the
segments.
3. 10. Acanthobdelida forms a connecting link between Oligochaeta and
Hirudinea.

Example: A single Russian genus and species (Acanthobdella) parasitic on

salmon.

Order 2. Rhynchobdellida

1. 1. They live as ecto-parasite on snails, frogs and fishes. Marine and

freshwater. Aquatic leeches also belongs to this order.
1. 2. The anterior part of body may be protruded and retracted so as to
form a proboscis or introvert.
2. 3. Each typical body segment consists of 3, 6 or 12 rings.
1. 4. The mouth is small slit like median aperture situated in the anterior
sucker.
1. 5. A protrusible proboscis with no jaws.
 1. 6. Coelom is reduces to sinuses without compartments and botryoidal
tissues.
1. 7. Blood vascular system separated from coelomic sinuses. Blood is
colorless.

Examples: Glossiphonia, Placobdella, Helobdella, Piscicola, Pontobdella,

Branchellion,
Ozobranchus.

Order 3. Gnathobdellida

1. 1. These are generally fresh water or terrestrial form.

1. 2. They are ectoparasitic blood-sucking organisms.
1. 3. Anterior sucker is with three jaws, one median dorsal and two
ventro-lateral.
1. 4. Proboscis is non-protrusible or absent.
1. 5. Blood is red coloured.

6. Coelom is reduced. Botryoidal tissue present.

Examples: Hirudo, Hirudinaria, Haemadipsa.

Order 4. Pharyngobdellida

1. 1. This order includes freshwater amphibious carnivorous leeches.

1. 2. They are terrestrial and aquatic, some are predaceous.
1. 3. Each body segment is divided into five rings or annuli.
1. 4. Pharynx is non-protrusible. No teeth but one or two styles may be
present.

Examples : Erpobdella, Dina.

CLASS 4. Archiannelida (Gr. arch = first)

1. 1. This group represents the primitive members of annelids.

1. 2. About one dozen genera of small, marine worms of unknown
affinities are included in this class.
 2. 3. Body is elongated, cylindrical with internal segmetation.
1. 4. The head is distinct bearing the tentacles, eyes and ciliated pit.
1. 5. Parapodia and setae are wanting (missing).
1. 6. Sexes usually separate. Gonads develops only during breeding
season by active proliferation of coelomic epithelium.
1. 7. Usually trochophore larva.

Examples: Polygordius, Dinophilus, Protodrilus.

SUMMARY

The name annelida is simply derived from the term ‘annulus’ means ring, due to
appearance of animals like the ring in this phylum. These animals possess true
metamerism because of completely segmented body of the organisms and each
segment acts as an individual animal. In the lecture, we have studied about the
general characters of annelids regarding the habit and habitat, digestive system,
circulatory system, excretory system, nervous system, reproductive system and
certain distinguishing characters of annelida. The discussed topic is useful to
study the systemic position of annelida in animal kingdom as well as their
interactions with other phyla. Further, it will also help in understanding the
characteristic differences of various classes of the phylum annelida.